NDP promises incentives for neighbourhood clinics

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This article was published 07/09/2023 (1001 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Brandon was named as one of five locations in the province that will receive a new clinic, according to a political campaign announcement made by the leader of Manitoba’s NDP on Wednesday.

Wab Kinew is promising to open five neighbourhood health clinics in the province if his party is elected Oct. 3.

The clinics would serve patients who have injuries or illnesses that don’t require a trip to an emergency room and would be staffed with a team of ER doctors, nurses and technologists.

Patients in need of urgent, but not emergency care, would make an online appointment and see a doctor the same day.

“This allows you to be seen by an emergency room doctor who will quickly be able to triage your situation, deliver the care that you need, whether that’s a cast, stitches, an X-ray, maybe a prescription, or in the case of something more serious, be able to identify the early warning signs and refer you to a higher level of care,” Kinew said.

The NDP leader’s announcement was made in Winnipeg outside the Corydon Avenue Minor Illness and Injury Clinic about 20 minutes southwest of downtown.

Kinew insisted that the new clinics, including one in the Prairie Mountain Health region, will help recruit and retain new doctors to the province, by providing shifts that will work with their schedules while keeping their skills sharp.

One of the physicians who started the Minor Illness and Injury Clinic, Dr. Norm Silver, said the new clinics will help make Manitoba a more attractive place to work, and added “the more options doctors are offered, the better.”

“We’re not political at all. We just want to make sure that patients are taken care of, and making sure that people are seen in the lowest cost environment with the best possible service. We know how bad emergency rooms are, and it’s not because they’re bad for what they need to be there for. They’re not appropriate for a lot of things that end up going there. And it’s no one’s fault at all. Patients have nowhere else to go, so that’s where they end up,” Silver said in phone interview with the Sun.

Under the NDP’s campaign plan, the physicians at the neighbourhood injury and illness clinics will be offered an incentive in the form of financial compensation to cover the costs of having a nurse on staff, as well as supplies.

“For each of these clinics, we estimate that this will be a $2-million annual expense as we stand them up. We’ll be proceeding with a phased in approach meaning one clinic in year one, a second clinic in year two, and then the third, fourth to fifth clinics in years three and four,” Kinew said.

Reacting to Kinew’s campaign promise, Manitoba Liberal Leader Dougald Lamont said the NDP’s plan is something that Manitoba Liberals have already committed to as part of their plan for preventive care in Manitoba.

“The difference is that we have a plan to staff and pay for clinics, while the NDP does not. We are facing a staffing crisis that is set to get worse. The NDP haven’t accounted for retirements in their staffing plan, and they don’t have a plan to attract and keep people in the system. We do,” Lamont said in an email statement to the Sun.

The Progressive Conservative party criticized Kinew’s announcement as well as his party’s proposed reopening of three emergency rooms in Winnipeg.

“Wab Kinew’s phoney promises to build eight new medical facilities, which includes the three Winnipeg ERs in a global staff shortage shows his lack of experience,” the Tories said a statement sent to the Winnipeg Free Press on Wednesday.

» mmcdougall@brandonsun.com

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